ABOARD THE CNN ELECTION EXPRESS IN ILLINOIS (CNN) - We’re heading west, making our way through what can safely be considered Obama Country.

The Democrat’s presumptive presidential nominee also has a day job, and that’s Senator from Illinois. Before that Barack Obama was a longtime state lawmaker here, and prior to that he was a community organizer in Chicago.

We’ve been driving through a number of crucial battleground states on our way from DC to Denver, site of the Democratic National Convention, but this isn’t one of them. Vice President Al Gore won Illinois by double digits in 2000, Senator John Kerry took the state by double digits four years ago, and Obama’s expected to easily win his home state this time around.

While there’s not that much electoral drama in Illinois, it’s a different story in the two states we just passed through. Indiana’s a traditional red state that Obama would like to turn blue. And Michigan’s a state that's gone for the Democrats in the past two presidential elections, but John McCain would like to turn it red.

AP: McCain adviser got money from Georgia
John McCain's chief foreign policy adviser and his business partner lobbied the senator or his staff on 49 occasions in a 3 1/2-year span while being paid hundreds of thousands of dollars by the government of the former Soviet republic of Georgia.

WSJ Op-ED: Sen. John McCain: We Are All Georgians
For anyone who thought that stark international aggression was a thing of the past, the last week must have come as a startling wake-up call. After clashes in the Georgian region of South Ossetia, Russia invaded its neighbor, launching attacks that threaten its very existence. Some Americans may wonder why events in this part of the world are any concern of ours. After all, Georgia is a small, remote and obscure place. But history is often made in remote, obscure places.